10th IACC – Prague, 2001 Workshop Report – National integrity systems: Can their effectiveness be measured? Chair: Gayle Hill, Freehills Solicitors, Transparency International Australia Prof. Charles Sampford, Director, Key Centre for Ethics, Law, Justice and Governance, Australia, c.sampford@mailbox.gu.edu.au - An Integrity Systems Assessment for the Queensland Public Service Panellists: David Kimber, Associate Professor, RMIT University, Melbourne, Australia, davidk@rmit.edu.au - An Integrity Systems Assessment for Australian Business Paul MacKellar, Arthur Anderson, Australia, paul.s.mackellar@andersen.au.com - Intrasight, a Diagnostic Tool that Assists Organisations to Check Employee Understanding for Corporate Values and Ethics Prof. Alan Doig, Teesside Business School, United Kingdom, r.a.doig@tees.ac.uk - International Integrity Systems Assessment of 18 countries Jack Titsworth, Governance and Anti-corruption Consultant, The World Bank, jtitsworth@worldbank.org - Institutional Indicators Contribution by Charles Sampford National Integrity System Assessments Corruption and integrity are conceptually opposite: Corruption is the abuse of entrusted power for private gain. Integrity is the exercise of public power in accord with stated values and institutional purposes - being true to yourself. There is no one institution or set of rules which can combat corruption and establish integrity. We need a number of institutional pillars mutually reinforcing and supporting. Measuring integrity can be done by employing such processes as a checklist approach or a systems approach. Procedure for QNISA: what are the institutions of the Queensland integrity system workshop to scope out the project in-depth interviews to develop agency profiles - origins and history, current roles, values it is trying to further, what is it achieving, means used and interactions with other bodies workshops to discuss the problems and opportunities they had with each other - including using case studies Problems: co-ordination problems - it is not clear where a person should take a complaint no unified appeals system local government is the largest source of potential corruption and least well equipped regional issues - big city, small towns maladministration Preliminary conclusions: need of comparative studies can have too many integrity organisations need map of the systems available agencies should plan to build ethics into everything they do Contribution by David Kimber Business Integrity System Assessment (BISA) There is a difference between business integrity systems and those required in the business sector. 23 organisations used as case studies (out of a total of 60 approached). Survey approach was used. Primarily qualitative/interpretive supported by quantitative data do not represent a deep analysis. What is integrity in a business environment? BIS is the link between the public and institutional systems which preserve the organisation. Integrity system has three components: individual organisation society Challenges: financial priorities change, growth and technology employee entitlement, temptation, results pressure work culture combating industry ethos competition consistency Implications: relationship between BIS and organisational failure - increasing risk factors likely to impact on BIS in the future: a. social and technological change b. organisational growth/decline relationship between social and organisational culture and BIS maintenance BIS multi-dimensional, co-ordinated approach needed Recommendations: Organisations need to develop a pro-active, holistic, integrated perspective to BIS. Impact of organisational decision making on personal integrity needs to be more consciously addressed. Public policy development should address BIS as a key influence. Conclusion: BIS is a core issue underpinning modern civilisation. BIS development and maintenance should be addressed as a key issue for this conference. Contribution by Paul MacKeller Intrasight - A Diagnostic Tool Intrasight is a web powered survey, with a better response rate than paper based surveys. It is designed to help organisations assess their ethical culture and evaluate the outcomes of their ethics and compliance programs. The study found that the factors with the greatest positive influence on the outcomes of ethics and compliance programs were: leadership commitment to ethics consistency between an organisation's policies and practices fair treatment of employees open discussion of ethics in the organisation perception that ethical behaviour is rewarded The study found that the factors with the greatest negative influence on the outcomes of ethics and compliance programs were: an organisational culture that requires an understanding obedience to authority the organisation has a "self-interest" focus The study measures the following ethics program outcomes: observed unethical/illegal behaviour employee awareness of legal or ethical issues advice seeking delivering bad news to management reporting violations to organisation decision making in the organisation employee commitment to the organisation Internet address is not publicly available, but is available from Mr. MacKellar (cost varies, but is not too expensive) Contribution by Alan Doig International Integrity System Assessment In the research carried out by TI national chapters, 18 countries participated. A TI questionnaire was sent out and triangulated against previous research and other sources. It was asked for both formal and informal responses to questions. Findings Which countries have or do not have anti-corruption pillars. Corruption is culturally and country specific. TI national chapters are excellent across the board, producing well researched reports. Most countries have a National Integrity System - so why don't they work in some countries? Therefore, there is a need to look at what they are doing. Contribution by Jack Titsworth Institutional Indicators The presentation was based on work in Uganda over the last few years. Indicators function as information that describes the results of a particular integrity strategy or action. They can apply to processes, results and risks. Operationally relevant indicators (how do we deal with the things that aren't working): should be simple and relevant should be engaging: key stakeholders should agree they are important and be committed to using them should come under the remit of a senior public official, who can be appraised against what the indicators portray; this will enhance their operational relevance Purposes of indicators exercise: to diagnose key areas of corrupt practice to monitor and control the core functions of government that must work well to curb corruption to mainstream the use of indicators Indicators and the logic of result-oriented processes: input: money and staff used by law enforcement, legal and judicial bodies output: investigations, prosecutions, trials, judgements and recovery of funds outcome: increased risk of engaging in corrupt practices Conclusions There are two important and complementary methodologies - both are being extended. There are also two important and different approaches to describing integrity systems both are valuable. Need to look to see what institutions there are in each NIS. Some countries have a tick in all boxes, but are highly corrupt. Others like the Netherlands did not have all of them, but have very little corruption. The point is to ask: Why is this the case? Understand systematic quality of the interaction between elements of the integrity system: our work Some important further issues potential importance of a co-ordinating role importance of resources and responsibility comparative budget data looking for performance indicators for corruption Within all of this, there are a number of points to bear in mind: importance of in-country analysis and research appreciate cultural differences: embedded in cultures understand relationship between ethics, integrity and corruption prevention understand interaction between business integrity systems and government integrity systems different perceptions of the integrity systems by participants distinguish compliance and integrity based systems taking us from research and understanding to advocacy the better the research, the more confident we may be in our advocacy ethics: asking hard questions about our values, giving honest and public answers and trying to live by them. National integrity systems represent national means by which we may live by our values. Main Themes Covered 1. The need to identify techniques for mapping integrity systems and to discuss their effectiveness 2. The need to address how national integrity systems can be assessed 3. The need to discuss how to evaluate the effectiveness of the coordination and mutual support provided by the pillars of an integrity system 4. The need to canvass whether integrity systems can be audited - and if so, on what criteria. 5. The need to examine the relationship between mapping and assessment of integrity systems and more familiar measurements of corruption Main Conclusions 1. Importance of in-country analysis and research needs to be emphasised as well as the differences between cultures and countries. 2. It is necessary to understand the relationship between ethics, integrity and corruption prevention and the interaction between business integrity systems and government integrity systems. 3. Ethics - it is necessary to ask hard questions about our values, to give honest and public answers and try to live by them. National integrity systems represent national means by which we may live by our values.